


The Haunting of Grimmauld Place

by Fluffyllama (Llama)



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Dubious Consent, M/M, Underage Drinking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-08-24
Updated: 2011-08-24
Packaged: 2017-10-23 00:50:38
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,251
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/244433
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Llama/pseuds/Fluffyllama
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ron watches Sirius, and Sirius has noticed.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Haunting of Grimmauld Place

**Author's Note:**

  * For [kennahijja (Hijja)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hijja/gifts).



There’s a brooding presence in Grimmauld Place again tonight.

Mrs Weasley treads carefully around it, when she isn’t pursing her lips in disapproval. Hermione gives it troubled glances, and doesn’t even dare mention Harry’s name when it shambles among them spreading silence and the stench of stale whisky. Even the twins whisper in corners, poring over secret parchments instead of embracing their host with their usual vigour.

It prowls the hallways, it pokes in the corners at imaginary creatures, it swears at “That no good bloody house-elf”, and then it takes off for hours, as it has done every night since they crept through the cobweb layers of this house like maggots invading an empty corpse.  
  
When the door slams shut on it, though, normality gradually returns. It takes a while, but Ron waits and watches, feels the atmosphere lighten little by little. First the fire burns a little brighter; the air loses its chill. Soon Hermione even smiles faintly when she looks up from her book, but he doesn’t smile back. Mrs Weasley sighs in exasperation at Fred, or is it George? Ron can’t tell right now which one is which.

Yet somehow, he always knows exactly where the restless figure upstairs is pacing, which rooms he’s haunting; he can even feel the path it takes from desk to window, to library, to bathroom, to bed… a well worn track that Ron has listened to in its many permutations for days and nights now.

“Best leave him be,” his mother always says, as if Sirius is as dangerous as he looks. “He has a nasty temper, that one.” Maybe he has, but Ron still wants to argue with her – she talks as if he’s a real criminal, but he’s an innocent man. Or at least, as innocent as a thirty-odd year old escaped convict who drinks too much can be.

And that’s the problem, really. Now he’s here, and even if the accommodation isn’t exactly comfortable he is at least well-fed and has a bed to sleep in, Sirius should be happier, shouldn’t he? Happier than sleeping in hedges and living off rats, at least. But his long, shaggy hair never quite makes it to fully untangled, and however many times Sirius swears he’ll do it, somehow it never gets cut.

Then there are the scars on his hands, and the tattoos that Ron remembers glimpsing through a torn shirt. The eyes that still sometimes bore into him in that way they did on a dark night among the dust and splinters of the shack. He didn’t understand the look then, and he doesn’t now, not enough, anyway. It all screams of experience, of adulthood, of something just out of his reach, especially when he lies awake at night next to an empty bed, a child sent out of the way while the grown ups talk.

It will be different when Harry’s here.

But for now there is only him to listen to the raised voices echoing up from the kitchen. Snape, icy and cold. Sirius loud and harsh. That’s the usual way of things, though tonight there’s a third voice rising above them both, and Ron cringes at his mother’s tone. When she loses it, she really loses it, and neither of those men are taking it well, by the sound of it.

Doors slam, and there’s footsteps on the stairs. Harmless curses are growled at the shrieks from Mrs Black’s portrait, and Ron waits, pulse thumping in his ears, for the familiar bedroom circuit to start up. Instead there’s a crunch from somewhere outside, and a thud—and then silence.

Ron tries to stay in bed, even though he can feel something pulling him upright, eyes wide and breathing loud in the darkness of the room. He waits for the footsteps to continue, but something’s happened. The pattern is broken, and his eyes won’t stay shut, wondering why nobody has come to do something about it yet.

Nobody leaves, nobody comes. It takes a whimper of pain to move him, but then he’s out of bed like a landslide, slipping down the sheets and blankets to the floor. It’s undignified, but he doesn’t care, and he’s so busy untangling himself from the mess that it’s only when he opens the door that he remembers his thin pyjamas aren’t going to be warm enough out there.

Sirius turns, and there’s that wild-eyed look again. Ron should be afraid, because this man has sharp teeth even when he doesn’t have his fist jammed into the wall, and wounded creatures are always dangerous, he knows that. But the wince of pain as Sirius twists his arm to pull it out drives him forward, and when plaster dust and old splinters cover them he’s there to steady the gaunt frame. Sirius’ forearm is blood-streaked and and bloody _hell_ that must hurt, but he hardly seems to notice until Ron takes hold of it. It’s hard, bony and brittle in his grasp. Fragile, almost.

“You should have that looked at,” says Ron, and it sounds stupid, but he can see himself taking Sirius down to the kitchen to his Mum, who at least then might notice something is really wrong here. Maybe she’d even notice that Ron can be trusted, maybe could be allowed to know a few things. But the fantasy is destined to remain in his head, because Sirius pulls his arm away at the suggestion. His breath is ripe and ragged, heavy with the stink of whisky again.

Ron waits, but Sirius doesn’t move, doesn’t speak. There are just those eyes, dark and heavy with nameless burdens. They’re fixed on his face, and suddenly he’s too close to the man who’s leaning heavily against the mouldy wallpaper of the landing.

“Or,” he says hurriedly, “I could fix it up.”

Sirius sits on the bed and focuses on pouring another drink while Ron works, and he doesn’t seem to notice the clumsiness of Ron’s patch-up job.

“Your mother is a bitch,” Sirius announces when he’s finished inspecting his newly bandaged arm.

“She’s okay,” Ron mutters, and he’d leave but Sirius is filling a second glass and leaning towards him conspiratorially.

“She wants to baby you all.” Sirius snorts into his whisky, and Ron lets his drink just wet his lips. It burns when he licks them, but in a good way.

And yes, that does rankle, because there are adults out there who haven’t faced half of what he, Harry and Hermione have faced… well, Harry anyway. Harry even gets to have an interesting godfather, not old Great Uncle Sedgefield, who was about the only one left for Ron by the time he turned up.

“My godfather smells of cabbage,” Ron says morosely, but that just makes Sirius throw his head back and roar. Ron pushes the glass away from him nervously, because if his mum catches him here his life won’t be worth _living_.

Sirius just sloshes more amber liquid into the bottom of it.

“Erm, cheers then.” And too late to stop his gulp Ron remembers he hasn’t even really tasted it yet, and now his throats on fire and his face must be glowing bright red and he’s going to cough and splutter it all over–

“Head down, deep breath,” Sirius is saying above him, and oh, blessed cool, cool water on his neck, on his face, hands holding him over the washbasin by the window. He grabs for a clean towel, and his mother might have been mean about Sirius but he didn’t have freshly laundered anything when he was living in a bloody cave, did he?

Ron’s probably not going to be saying that any time soon, however. He’s not going to be saying anything, because his throat isn’t going to work forever, and even if it was there’s something hypnotic about the rough fingers stroking his damp hair off his face.

Hypnotic, and maybe more. “You’re really not a baby, are you?” Sirius’s chuckle is downright dirty, and if Ron had any heat left to blush with he would turn redder, but the blood he has is rushing south faster than he can wriggle free. It’s too late anyway, and he really is going to need thicker pyjamas if his body is going to get all out of control any time someone comes near him.

“It’s okay.” Sirius’s hand on his forehead is soothing, but there’s nothing soothing about the one grasping his hip. “You should have seen me and James at your age. We could barely get through an afternoon without giving each other a helping hand.”

Ron’s mouth is open now, but there are no words coming out, and with the pictures in his head that’s probably for the best.

“I know you’ve been watching me,” Sirius is murmuring, and the hand on Ron’s hip is circling, predatory, moving with intent and the worst of it is that Ron sort of wants it to. He _wants_ to know what it feels like, a hand pressed _there_ , a hand that isn’t his.

He dreams about that sometimes.

“Do you?” Sirius whispers, his voice warmer, just for him and nobody else, and Ron didn’t know he was saying it aloud but maybe Sirius can read minds anyway. He certainly seems to know what’s in Ron’s, although it’s possible the way he’s pressing closer is a bit of a clue.

Ron can only nod over the sink, but he thinks that’s enough because his stomach is bare now against the cold white porcelain, his pyjama cord a tangle of loosened knots that isn’t holding anything up any more and a strong, firm hand is holding him steadily in place.

“Hold still now,” says the burn of whisky breath in his ear, and “Good boy, that’s it,” as he pushes into a warm fist, leaking a trail from wrist to fingertips that feels so, so good when he pulls back. There’s a warmth against his back too, and after a quick fumble, something hot and hard rubbing against his hip. He wants to make Sirius feel as good as he does right now, but if he loosens his grip on the basin he’s not sure his legs will hold him up, and Sirius seems to be doing just fine on his own.

“I– I’m–” he gasps, but Sirius just chuckles.

“Not yet,” he says, and that glorious fist stops, holding him still between Sirius and the basin. “You haven’t seen anything yet.” There’s a wet, sucking sound, and–

“Oh, _blimey_ ,” Ron says fervently, because he hadn’t even thought of this, but there’s something so wrong about the wet finger pushing at his arse that he can’t help but jerk his hips, and before it’s past the first knuckle he’s panting hard and his dick is sliding through that slick fist beyond his power to prevent it.

And now his legs really are going to give way, because that has to be two fingers slipping and twisting their way in, and he’s not ready for that, he’s really not, but Sirius is breathing fire down his neck and hey, at least he doesn’t think Ron is a kid, right?

“Ron,” Sirius groans, and that’s not his fingers there now, pushing inside him and it’s too tight, it’s not going to work, not really; but Ron doesn’t care because this is _Sirius Black_ , it’s Harry’s godfather, and if he could decide which was more thrilling he’d probably know whether he was about to come his brains out all over the wall or fall over, and god only knows he’s not sure about that. The touching, the fingers, they don’t really count, he knows that, but this? This is what it’s all about, this is _having sex_ and that’s it for Ron, there’s no more holding it back.

“That’s right, you come for me,” Sirius whispers, a wicked delight in his voice that makes Ron shiver in pleasure as much as the aftershocks still running down his spine, through his dick and leaking the evidence through Sirius’s clenched fist. The force of it pushes him back hard, but he’s pretty sure Sirius is still barely inside him when he feels a matching wet heat trickle down to cool sticky on the back of his legs.

He’s going to count it anyway.

“Better clean up before you go back to bed, kid.” Sirius is crashed out on the crooked four-poster when Ron straightens up, robes askew and angry red cock still half hard and shiny.

It feels like a dismissal, and that’s something Ron’s all too used to from the adults in this house. He thought Sirius was different. He _thought_ he understood.

“Hey.” He turns in time to catch a wink and follows an outstretched hand to the bed. “Tomorrow, all right? Harry won’t be here for a few more days.”

“Yeah, tomorrow.” Ron grins, and allows Sirius to pull him close enough for a hungry kiss that promises tomorrow, there won’t be any doubt.

There’s a bounce in his step that wasn’t there before on the way back to his bed, and he’s not going to be falling asleep for a long time tonight, but he doesn’t care. He’s the only one who gets to see that Sirius, something other than the prowling, growling creature that stalks the house. He’s had too few possessions of his own not to treasure it.

It’ll all be different when Harry gets here.

So he’ll just have to make the most of it.


End file.
